


Asters in Bloom

by ObliObla



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hell, Post-Season/Series 04, Stars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:15:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21544375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObliObla/pseuds/ObliObla
Summary: There were no flowers in Hell, or stars either. Only ash and brimstone and night.And time. There was so much time. There was so much time Chloe felt she might drown in it.
Relationships: Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar
Comments: 38
Kudos: 224





	Asters in Bloom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ZeeLinn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZeeLinn/gifts).



> Happy birthday, Zee! May your day, your year, your life be filled with stars ❤️
> 
> This fic is based on this beautiful [art](https://zeearts.tumblr.com/post/187331521915/a-fun-sketch-for-obliobla-s-birthday-thank-you) of Zee's.

There were no flowers in Hell, or stars either. Only ash and brimstone and night.

And time. There was so much time. There was so much time Chloe felt she might drown in it.

She never meant to be here. Lucifer never meant her to be here. She lived a life, long and full, or as full as she could manage, under the circumstances. And then she had kissed her daughter goodbye—for the moment—closed her eyes, and waited for the light she knew she’d go to.

But when her eyes opened, it wasn’t to silver and pearl and a brilliance outshining that of anything she’d ever known. No, it was to fire and blood and pain.

She lived the worst moments of her life over and over and over again. A bullet made from lead and copper, a knife made from love and loss. A vial made from betrayal, his and hers. A mirror, where she could see every sin, every failure. Blood pouring from her hands, the flesh peeling from her bones, until all she could see was a face that haunted both nightmares and dreams. His face. Or her own. And then he found her, as he’d, perhaps, always find her. The Devil, who had returned to his kingdom of damnation and ruin to keep her safe, to keep them all safe, offered her his hand.

And, _oh,_ had he raged against the dying of her light.

He would have severed the bars of Heaven’s gate, would have raised Hell on Earth to bring her up to salvation. But the cost was too great. The cost had always been too great, for both of them. And for a very long time, she simply mourned. Mourned the loss of a place she’d never seen, mourned the loss of friends and family she’d never see again.

He feared always that she would lose herself to the cruelty and the torment. And she was afraid as well, that she would forget beauty and mercy and kindness in the depths of her grief. That she would forget how flowers grow, how the stars shine in the night, in a place without either. But he never had forgotten those things, not truly, and she didn’t either.

It was the simple things that got to her the most, after that initial wave of desolation, after she came to fully understand why he had become what he was. The many facets of him. Why there was fire in his eyes; why there was agony in his heart.

There was no music in Hell, nor was there softness, tenderness, or warmth. There was no drink that didn’t taste of sulfur, nor food that didn’t taste of ash. There was no joy untainted by sorrow. And in quiet moments, kneeling on the hard stone floor of the chambers he had made for them, she prayed to a god she didn’t believe in, and let the tears fall to mingle with the ash.

But Lucifer was a crafty Devil, and he had spent untold eons building up order from chaos. There was much he would put up with that he’d never let happen to Chloe. And so he put his mind to work on the problem of Hell.

She lost him, then, for a time that stretched and stretched—though what were months or years or centuries in a place without moon or sun or stars? She wondered if it was worth it, whatever he was doing, that lines crawled across his more angelic face and shadows pooled beneath his eyes.

She awoke one false dawn to find him sitting by her bedside. _Come with me,_ he said, weariness lost to an excitement she rarely saw anymore, and he offered her his hand.

He led her through corridors and down stairs, past echoes of darkness she never had truly managed to harden her heart to. He led her past his throne—that great, twisted thing she never wanted to look at, but had such a hard time tearing her eyes away from—and out a door set off to the side.

And there, in a courtyard tucked between massive obsidian spires, was a garden.

It was nothing like what she’d heard of paradise, not quite like anything on Earth, but in a place so dry and barren, its beauty was astonishing. The rough-hewn walls were still studded with torches burning blue, but vines crept up around them, green and full of life. Trees grew twisted but verdant, their vast canopies brushing against the dark glass dome that covered the space, lower branches hanging heavy with ripe, succulent fruit. And the flowers…

They grew in every color she’d seen on Earth, and more besides, covering the dull, gray ground with a dense blanket of verdancy. She stepped out into it, smelling something other than smoke and brimstone for the first time in so long she’s almost forgotten what sweetness was. She took a deep breath, extending her arms, spinning around in wild abandon among the foliage.

And, for the first time since she had died, she laughed.

It seemed a strange sound, in Hell, roughened by how long it’d been since she’d been this happy. Since she’d been happy at all. But when she looked at him, she forgot everything but the softness of his expression, the pride there that was no kind of sin. And when she pressed her face to his shoulder, hiding the tears that pricked at her eyes from her joy, whispering under her breath, _thank you, thank you, thank you,_ he laughed as well.

And the sound was as sweet as sunlight on her skin.

But then he went away again, even though she told him the garden was enough. She wondered if Eve had once promised Adam the same, but he was no son of Adam, and he knew it wasn’t all she needed, knew its beauty wasn’t enough to sustain her. He knew she never visited it without shedding tears that fell as rain that never came. And as the days grew longer, she knelt beside her bed, no longer praying to any god but to an angel. To the Devil. Hoping he might hear her.

And maybe he did.

He returned one evening when she was sitting in front of the hearth, pressing a carved, stone queen across a heavy slab board. She’d taken to playing against herself while he was gone. _Come with me,_ he said, again, and he pulled her to her feet.

He led her down, and she wondered if they were returning to the garden, but instead he took her to a room she’d never seen before, buried deep within the endless corridors of the palace. It looked similar to the other places she’d been, badly lit by torchlight, grimy and close and a little musty. There was a long table in the center of the room, groaning with plates and bowls and cups. But unlike the other food and drink she’d had in Hell, this was neither charred nor sulfurous.

Instead, the platters were covered in roasts basted with spices and shining in the flickering light, pastries glazed with honey and bursting with fruit from the garden, vegetable dishes of endless variety, and sweet smelling, blood-red wines.

Her mouth watered immediately, and she stepped forward as a woman possessed. Hunger clawed at her belly, and she fell into a chair, bowing her head as if in prayer.

_How?_

He joined her at the table. _Anything for you, Chloe._

She barely remembered, now, what Earth’s food tasted like, would never know the taste of Heaven’s manna, but surely this was better than any meal she’d ever had. Every fruit was perfectly ripe, bursting on her tongue, sweet and fresh and tart. The meat was succulent and tender, melting in her mouth. The pastries were a revelation, and the wine was mellow and warming and stronger than she’d expected.

She found herself drifting off, and he gathered her into his arms, carrying her up to their chambers. The bed was not as soft as hers had been on Earth, but when he wrapped his arms around her, brushing her hair from her face, she had never felt more comfortable.

But in the morning, he was gone. Though when she pulled open the armoire he’d built to hold the rough-spun tunics and leather trousers she customarily wore, she found it filled instead with skirts and blouses, dresses and robes, all in a softness she hadn’t believed possible in Hell. Dyed every color she’d ever seen on Earth, and more besides, and painted up with flowers.

A tray was left beside the bed, piled with honey cakes and figs and wine, and there was a sprig of irises in an obsidian vase.

He was gone even longer, this time, long enough her worry slowly turned to anger. She hadn’t often wandered the palace, before, but with so much time on her hands, and so much frustrated energy thrumming under her skin, she found herself exploring every inch she could. Even the places that echoed with darkness, those she’d once turned away from, she watched, unflinchingly. Even the throne she soon looked upon without fear.

One day Chloe was making her way through a lower hallway, eating an apple she’d taken from the garden down to its core, when she caught a strange, unfamiliar sound. She pursued it, down dark corridors and up rough-hewn stairs, until she found herself in a large, high-ceilinged room.

In the center of the room stood Lucifer, fiddling with something that appeared to be halfway between a gramophone and a boom box.

_What are you…?_

_I’ve done it._ He looked up at her, beaming. _I’ve done it, Chloe._

He turned a dial, and music began to play. But it was not the strange, distorted sound that he’d explained all pleasant melody became in Hell. No, this music was clear and warm, and, beyond that, she recognized it.

 _Heart and soul,_ a woman sang. _I fell in love with you._

She approached, slowly, as if she were in a dream, and he placed a hand at her hip, another at her back, and began to lead them in a dance. She rested her hands on her shoulders, her cheek against his chest, and let herself be swayed and turned. All of her anger fell away with the heat of his body under her palms, with the sweetness of the music in the air.

When the song ended and another began, he guided her over to one side of the room, brushing her hair from her face. She let her eyes fell shut as he helped her into a low-backed chair, trusting he would care for her. He pressed, first, a strawberry to her lips, then a cup of wine. When she took it from his hands to continue to drink, he stepped behind her.

 _May I?_ he asked, his fingers already stroking through her hair.

 _Yes,_ she whispered.

He drew her hair out into many strands, weaving them together, occasionally slipping something cool and delicate against her scalp. She lost track of his movements, simply letting herself _be,_ maybe for the first time since she had died, since she had fallen so far into a darkness she’d begun to believe would never feel like home.

When he was done, he offered her his hand, and she took it, letting him lead her to a mirror. She gasped as she came into view—her hair was wreathed in daffodils, and amaranth was twisted carefully among the complicated braids.

_Do you like it?_

She turned in his arms and pressed kisses to his chin, his cheek, his lips.

And when they returned to their chambers after eating and drinking and dancing and talking, when she fell asleep again wrapped in his arms, satiated and blissful, she remembered how true joy felt. And in the morning, when she awoke, he was still there, lips tender against her skin.

He withdrew, but did not leave, simply holding out his hand. _Come with me,_ he said.

But this time he didn’t lead her deep into the palace, merely guiding her to the balcony. There was nothing different about the space, and she frowned. _What are we doing here?_

He cupped his hands, concentrating hard, and a small flame appeared, flickering between his palms. It burned red, then yellow, then blue, and them a pure, brilliant white so hot she could feel its warmth. He glanced upward as he gently blew on the fire, and her gaze was drawn with it.

It drifted up and up and up, before settling high in the sky, a small, twinkling ball of flame.

 _It seems I’ve not forgotten,_ he said, delighted.

_Forgotten what?_

And he smiled, soft and slow. _How to bring light._

He conjured innumerable flames, teased them into a thousand different shades, and sent them upward to dwell, shining brightly enough to cut through the ash and the darkness. As she watched them shimmer and shine, he turned to her, taking her hands in his.

 _How?_ she asked, as she had before.

 _Anything for you, my queen,_ he whispered.

And so it seems there _are_ flowers in Hell, and stars as well. And every beauty of Heaven or Earth that the queen of Hell desires from her king.

And time, of course. There is so much time. But what joy is time spent in the company of someone you love?


End file.
